Do you balance your checkbook?

I eyeball my statements every month to ensure that nothing odd is going on. That combined with getting an email anytime money goes in or out of my account gives me most of what I need to know.
This is how I stay on top of my incoming and outgoing accounts.
 
No - maybe 30 years since I did that. Why not you might ask? Well, when I balanced my checkbook I found that I made more errors than the bank computer did. Turns out that computers are really good at adding and subtracting. Who knew?

I do check and make sure I recognize all of the transactions both in my checking account and for the credit card. I'll leave the computers to their adding and subtracting.

Cheers.
 
Somewhat. I balance at the beginning of the month for the upcoming month, using known upcoming deposits and credit card and other known payments. Kind of like a proforma income statement.
 
Yes, the primary reason is to confirm that bills/transactions were completed. I log in to my account a couple times a month to use bill pay, and just check the bank's record against mine to make sure what I've sent to/from the account was deducted or credited. It takes a few minutes a month to log what I've paid/transferred and verify that it cleared.

I was still mailing checks to pay my bills at this time last year, and the postal service was having lots of issues getting my bills to their destinations. But I was aware, because I keep track of my bank account. Now I've moved forward and use bill pay, but I am not going to trust the bank to care more about my money than I do, the same as I keep track of all activities in my other financial accounts and credit cards.
 
We do - though I recognize it's not needed. Mostly, it's so DW captures the transactions in our joint checking register. Otherwise, I'd see withdrawals on the account and have no idea what they were related to. Helps me to validate legitimacy.
 
While in college thankfully there were enough local banks that when I got an overdraft notice I'd go in and close the account and move to another bank and get the free gift.
Until I married DW that is. She worked as a teller back then. Worked up to VP, third in line. There was NO way she'd allow an overdraft. She still balances all of our accounts regularly.
 
I use a version of Quicken from about 2002 as my check book and financials register. I reconcile my two bank accounts monthly. Mostly I use Quicken to plan cash flow. I know I will have a big property tax payment next month (paid online) and I plan how much to transfer out of the money market account into checking for that. I spend way too much time at it but at least I kind of like to count my money. Most of my gifts to family are via check and Zelle so when I do an end of the year look-see at my spend I can easily see amounts in categories for these and bill-pay items and also it's easier to look in Quicken to see what estimated tax payments I made. I've been using this program for at least 3 computers since early 2000s so I could go back and look at ancient history but I don't. I no longer get paper receipts for most credit card/debit card/ATM transactions since I never found an error in the years I did look at those things. I do look at my credit cards online about every week to make sure there aren't any fraudulent charges but again the CC bank is really fast at finding those too.
 
I keep a transaction register in excel. I put all anticipated transactions for a few months and then add any I make throughout the month. I do balance the amount I have in excel to my bank balance.
That came in handy when I inadvertently put my credit card payment in the credit side and not the debit side. :facepalm:
 
I balance it every month. Even catch the occasional mistake, generally on my part. I even order some new check registers from Amazon a few days ago. They're probably sitting on my front porch right now.
 
I have a spiral notebook that I record all my credits, debits and checks and I check my account daily. I only write checks to the groomer and chiropractor because they don’t take cards. I keep a 1k buffer. I check my credit card accounts frequently as I’ve known a few people to have massive fraud.
 
No. What precipitated this was we stopped writing checks in favor of online transfers and paying by credit card for our bills. We write maybe 1 check every 6 months. I do look online at our bank and credit card transactions several times a week. My wife keeps a budget to track our spending.
 
I keep a check register. I rarely write an actual check. All the transactions in the checking account are monthly automatic bill payments by ACH. Or I receive a Zelle from one of our sons or send a Zelle to them. Pretty simple.

Coming from the days of paper and pencil, sometimes those old methods are good enough. Not everything needs to be modernized.
 
Checkbook? Is that a thing? LOL My wife and I wrote so few checks that keeping one is useless. Everything is digital now, which is great for collecting credit card points. But, I do reconcile my accounts almost every day because I use Quicken. This is great because my bank, credit cards, and investments are all updated with just one step. Plus, it helps me keep track of my expenses and plan my taxes.
 
I also use Quicken for all checking, savings, credit card and investment accounts. When I make a major transaction I also upload a copy of the receipt to the transaction record. Many times it's come in handy for easy access for warranty or reorder queries.
 
DW balances the check book - sorta. It's usually within a Grand of what the bank says. Not sure why she just can't quite get it. She has 3 calculators if you count both our phones.

I say nothing because I don't want to do it.
 
We have had a 2nd account for years, but never had checks until a couple months ago.
I spoke to soon.... I haven't balanced an account since the 90s when I was the FD treasurer... DW changed her Direct deposit to the new account, and handed me the old checkbook... Now I have the joy of keeping track until we get this group of 5 accounts moved over.
 
Wife balances the checkbook for our living expenses; groceries, utilities,
Etc.

I have a checking acct that I use for investment purposes and lumpy expenses. Never balance it but can tell you down to a dollar the current balance.

Oh and I also had a checking acct way back in the day that dear wife didn’t know about. Funded it from overtime pay that came from a second paycheck. Never balanced it. But wife was so happy to find out about it when the crappy old house we bought as our first home needed a spendy kitchen remodel!!!
 
I do remember trying to balance my CB back in the day when we were counting pennies and living paycheck to paycheck. I was paying everything by check in those days and IIRC, about half the time my monthly balance and their balance didn't match. In every case after I reconciled the balances, I was always wrong. So these days, if the balance looks about right, I don't waste my time.
 
Following on the check register thread (Another Boomer Thing that (Apparently) has Died Off), how many of you still balance your checking account monthly? For those who don't, what steps do you take to ensure that all transaction have been properly recorded, no incorrect entries were made due to bank error, and how do you keep track of your current balance including outstanding transactions?

Needless to say, I still take my monthly statement and use it to balance the account. It only takes about 10 minutes once a month so it's certainly not a big ordeal and I've caught errors numerous times.
I still do it every month. It only takes a few minutes. I don't use many online bank payments (either checks or credit cards). I'd rather have the card points unless there is a fee.
 
I do not technically balance the 'checkbook'. I do write down checks in the registry, but only so that I can make sure I enter the transactions into my desktop version of Quicken (2005). I will reconcile/balance the checking account in Quicken at the end of the month with the bank statement.

Currently, I only regularly write one check a month (the water bill). I could automate that one away if I wanted to also, but I keep it as a check so I will remember how to write them over time.

At the pace I am writing checks (about 1 per month), I have a lifetime of printed checks available to me.
 
Following on the check register thread (Another Boomer Thing that (Apparently) has Died Off), how many of you still balance your checking account monthly? For those who don't, what steps do you take to ensure that all transaction have been properly recorded, no incorrect entries were made due to bank error, and how do you keep track of your current balance including outstanding transactions?

Needless to say, I still take my monthly statement and use it to balance the account. It only takes about 10 minutes once a month so it's certainly not a big ordeal and I've caught errors numerous times.
Never have - never will
 
Nope. Only write a half dozen checks in a year and they show up on our online checking account that we use for online bill pay. So, while I technically see the checks and would notice if it was an unusual amount, I don't do any balancing.
 
I do check and make sure I recognize all of the transactions both in my checking account and for the credit card. I'll leave the computers to their adding and subtracting.
I do the same. I look over my checking account transactions online about once a month. But with my most used credit card and my heavily used Fidelity CMA, I check the transactions online about weekly to catch any nefarious merchant charges.
 
Back
Top Bottom